musical musings from the frozen north:
torontopia, mont royal city and kawartha kottages

Friday, April 24, 2015

Terra Lightfoot - Every Time My Mind Runs Wild

Terra Lightfoot – Every Time My Mind Runs Wild (Sonic Unyon)

There’s lots to love about Hamiltonian Terra Lightfoot’s second
album: her songwriting has improved tenfold; she’s got a roaring rock band
behind her; she’s steeped in the most durable elements of classic rock, country
and Americana, and her music is exactly what you (okay, me, at least) want to
hear when you hit the bar on Friday night.

But records like that are a dime a dozen. Lightfoot has
something else going for her.

Everyone, it seems, loves a man who sings like a woman. And
everyone loves a woman who dresses like one of the guys on stage. But what of
the woman in a dress with a masculine—or, at the very least, androgynous—voice?
It’s not just that Lightfoot has a lower range, it’s the timbre of her voice
that sounds like no one else, male or female. She’s the Alison Moyet of
Canadian roots rock. It’s what makes or breaks her appeal; it doesn’t leave
anyone sitting on the fence, especially when she hangs onto notes at the climax
of a chorus ("No Hurry"). Producer Gus Van Go (Whitehorse) pushes her to go big
or go home; even the sparsely arranged ballads here (“NFB,” “Splinter”) don’t
shy away from big, brassy moments—and she pulls it off every time.

That approach applies not just to her voice: this is Lightfoot
putting all (or most) of her cards on the table. Opening with a rollicking
electric waltz, she frontloads the album with rockers before branching out to
tender folk songs or a 1950s 6/8 shuffle or two-step country. Every Time My
Mind Runs Wild is brimming with confidence, a calling card for a young artist
more than ready to make her mark.